Around the Great Lakes

Initial Planning

The initial planning of this trip involves using Google Earth to gain an overview of the routes and then zooming in to plan Legs. Each leg of the trip is working out to be between 75 to 125 miles initially or about 5 days of travel. Each week, I’m increasing the distance of a leg of travel. I expect to average 30 miles a day over the whole trip, so the final legs will probably end up being around 185 to 200 miles.

During the initial planning, I’m looking for big landmarks and good place to camp or land for a quick break. I’m also looking for anything that I think I might want to stop and photograph.

A typical initial plan looks like this:

Leg 1

Distance: 75 miles

Start: Fort Gratiot Light

Finish: Pointe aux Barques Lighthouse

Notes:

1. Put-in @ small park N of lighthouse
2. Lakeport State Park 7 miles N of start. Camping.
3. Lexington – “The 1st Resort North” Touristy
4. Port Sanilac – Jeff’s Marketplace.

After the initial planning is over, I have to decide what towns I want to make resupply stops at. During this trip, I’m going to resupply at grocery stores along the way. For a trip with many nearby urban centers this allows me advantages: I can carry only as much food as I needed until the next good town, I can switch up the menu as I desire, and I don’t have to deal with the logistics of food drops. For each of the towns that I expect to resupply in I’m contacting the local chamber of commerce and visitor centers to attempt to receive maps and suggestions of where to resupply. I’ve done this on two previous trips of mine and it worked out great.

In addition to finding out additional information for resupply stops, I’m getting additional information about each of the locations I identify as a place I want to stop and photograph. I’m starting this on Wikipedia and following through with visitor centers or the organization that runs the feature. Here’s an example Wikipedia article about Pointe aux Barques Lighthouse:

The Pointe aux Barques Lighthouse ranks among the ten oldest lighthouses in Michigan. It is an active lighthouse maintained by the US Coast Guard remotely, located in Lighthouse County Park on Lake Huron near Port Hope, Michigan in Huron County. “Pointe aux Barques” means ‘Point of Little Boats’, a descriptor of the shallow shoals and reefs that lurk beneath these waves, presenting a hazard to boats as they round Michigan’s Thumb.^[2]

On a long distance trip like this one, I have to take some of the initial planning with a grain of salt. Because I may run into sea conditions that just aren’t perfect for paddling. If I end up with a couple of bad Gale Force wind days, my 5 day leg could turn into a 7 day leg. Or if I’m lucky, I’ll have a tail wind for a couple of days and be able to cover a leg in 3 days. The key is to stay flexible while on the trip while still identifying key features of the shoreline during planning.

On my other paddling site, I write that Critical Thinking and Flexibility of Thought is one of the eight most important skills a expeditioner can have, and the difference between the ideal during planning and the real while on the trip calls on this skill. Without being flexible while out on the water, I could encounter many days of frustration when goals are or aren’t met.

I think the combination of planning like I’m doing and the understanding of ideal to real is a good way to approach this trip. And because the trip is so big, breaking it down into legs is a nice way to accomplish goals along the way. And feel a constant excitement of accomplishing goals.

Tags: Expedition, Planning, Sections